The Amazon Kindle Voyage looks to be officially discontinued. The product is no longer available to be purchased on the main Amazon website in Italy, France, Germany, Spain, United Kingdom and the United States. The only models that are still available are refurbished, but they will likely sell out quickly when Amazon puts them on sale again.
The Amazon Kindle Voyage originally came out in 2014 and used to be Amazon’s most expensive flagship e-reader, but it eventually lost its relevance when the Kindle Oasis was released. It never received Audible functionality via a firmware update, like many of the other Kindle e-readers did.
When the Voyage was initially released it really stood out. One of the big design changes with the Voyage is the screen is completely flush with the bezel. All prior Kindle e-readers had a sunken screen and employed infrared touchscreen technology. The new capacitive screen is much easier to interact with and allows for more pinpoint procession. It also had an ambient light sensor to automatically brighten or dim the screen based on your environment.
One of the most compelling features on the Voyage was Pagepress technology. It was a new way to turn the pages of an ebook, without having to swipe or tap on the touchscreen. There were two capacitive buttons on the sides of the Voyage that were flush with the bezel. Whenever you tapped on the small strip, you were greeted with Haptic Feedback, to let you know you pressed down on it. This allowed users to have an option on how they wanted to turn the pages of their books.
Amazon will be announcing a new entry level Kindle Basic and the Kindle Paperwhite 4 within the next month or two. It is likely that the Oasis has replaced the Voyage, and the company will not make a second generation model. I heard that Amazon will simply have a 3 SKU strategy for the Kindle lineup. The entry level Kindle, the mid-range Paperwhite and the Oasis 2.
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
